Dantewada, Silda suspects held

Jharkhand police arrested four Maoists, who might have taken part in the massacres of security personnel in West Bengal’s Silda and Chhattisgarh’s Dantewada.

Although the date of the arrest was not revealed, the police picked up Ramsai Hansda, Rajesh Mandi, Buddheswar Mahato and Ashim from different parts of Ranchi and Bokaro.

Suspected to be members the People’s Liberation Guerrilla Army of the banned Communist Party of India (Maoist), they were part of the force that killed 24 Eastern Frontier Rifles personnel at Silda on February 15 and 75 CRPF men in Dantewada on April 6.

“We’ve already communicated the matter to the West Bengal Police,” said Inspector General of Jhakhand Police’s Special Branch S.N. Pradhan.

He said the West Bengal Police chief Bhupinder Singh had already been informed about the arrests, as it proved Bengal’s claim that the state’s border with Jharkhand was being used by the Maoists.

“These four are important members of the Maoist guerrilla action squad, which carried out strikes against security forces. They were positioned at different sides during the Silda attack,” said a state police officer.

Preliminary investigations also revealed that the four were involved in more attacks in Bengal last year, including the killing of two police personnel and kidnapping of a police officer on October 20 and the killing of four EFR jawans on November 8 in West Midnapore district’s Sankrail and Gidhni, respectively.